NPA rebels ambush troops aiding typhoon victims in Philippines

From  the Mindanao Examiner (Dec 13): NPA rebels ambush troops aiding typhoon victims in Philippines

Communist rebels on Thursday attacked government troops sent to deliver relief goods to typhoon victims in Davao del Norte province in the southern Philippines, officials said. Officials said New People’s Army opened fire on members of the 60th Infantry Battalion in the village of Santo Nino in Talaingod town. “Members of 60th Infantry Battalion were fired upon at the outreach station in the village,” said Lt. Col. Lyndon Paniza, a spokesman for the 10th Infantry Division. Paniza did not say if there were casualties in the ambush, but claimed the attack occurred a day during a self-imposed cease-fire by the NPA. He said the rebels declared a holiday truce from December 5 to January 3, but he branded the NPA cease-fire as propaganda. “We all know that their promise of truce is nothing but a sugar coated lie to make them look like Good Samaritans. It is a mere façade to cloak their real identity as criminals. The rebel group is exploiting the distraught situation of the victims as propaganda and nothing else.” “This incident only manifests their insincerity in helping the people especially those badly affected residents. If we are on relief mission mode, then they are on business as usual mode without considering that the assault hampered our relief efforts,” Paniza said. He said just recently, rebels also abducted two children in San Isidro town after failing to kill their father who is a government soldier. There was no immediate statement from the rebels who are fighting for decades now for the establishment of a Maoist state in the country.

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